![]() Within a year, they had turned the operation completely around, making it profitable again.Įventually, they were able to buy Little America, and their timing was just perfect. The Holdings rolled up their sleeves and went to work, flipping burgers, waiting tables, pumping gas and making beds themselves. “And they knew him as such an incredible, business-type guy.” “He had worked hard for them from the time he was 8 years old,” Riggs said. Covey’s solution was to sell Earl and Carol Holding, who were in their 20s at the time, a 10 percent stake in the business, in return for taking over the operation’s management.Įarl had distinguished himself in Covey’s eyes by being an exceptional groundskeeper with an eye for detail, Riggs told Cowboy State Daily. “So, we’re able to take care of ourselves that way.” Holding Onīy the 1950s, Little America was losing money. “We also have our own fire station and trained volunteer fire people, because if we have a fire, it could be over a half an hour until we get help here,” Riggs said. Little America has its own utilities, including water treatment and storage, as well as its own Post Office, which opened in 1963. Employees living there have a short walk to get to work, he added, though most still opt to drive. The employee housing is popular, Riggs said, and has a waiting list. Monthly rents range from $300 for a small studio apartment to about $750 for a three-bedroom house with two bathrooms and a two-car garage. There are about 50 residences located on the backside of the property, and this is where some Little America employees live. They have blue signs, but ours has a city sign with a mileage to it.” “You know, no business has the green sign. “We have green signs on the highway that say Little America, just as if it were a city,” Riggs said. “But that makes us unique.”īecause it is so remote, the hotel has to have all of its own infrastructure, and it does function more or less as its own city, albeit one without an official mayor. ![]() “Typically, we go by something kind of standard,” he said. There’s no real official post office box or address once you’re at the property.”įrom time to time, Riggs has made up funny addresses that sound cool just to see if they will arrive. “If you were to send us mail, you could literally make up almost any address you want, as long as you use the ZIP code 82929,” he said. Little America Wyoming opened in 1934, and current General Manager Spencer Riggs admits to having a little bit of fun with the fact the hotel has its very own ZIP code. He put up a whole string of billboards to tell travelers at regular intervals just how far they were from Little America, and to warn them that nothing else would be available for many miles in either direction. A gallon of gas was 16 cents and an ice cream cone was 5 cents.Ĭovey adopted the penguin as his logo and named his business Little America. The price of a burger at that time was a mere 35 cents. The reminder inspired him to build a modest motel with 12 cabins, two gas pumps, a cocktail lounge, and a 24-seat café. In 1929, when Covey saw Admiral Byrd’s photos of his “Little America” camp in the Antarctic, he was reminded of that wish, born on that bitter cold night while he was caught in the Arctic grip of a Wyoming northeaster. I thought what a blessing it would be if some good soul would build a house of shelter of some kind on that god-forsaken spot.” “That long January night in that terrible storm with a 50-mile wind and the temperature about 40 below passed very, very slowly, and oh, how I longed for a warm fireside, something to eat, and wool blankets. “Away back in the (18)90s when I was a youngster and herding sheep in this dreary section of Wyoming, I became lost in a raging northeast blizzard and was forced to ‘Lay Out’ all night at this exact place where Little America now stands,” Covey wrote in the story on the placemats. The story began as a wish on a cold Wyoming winter night by Little America founder Stephen Mack Covey, who told the story on placemats at his travel stop which was then along Route 30. There’s a story behind the remoteness of this location, a story that’s as iconic Americana as the wooden penguins that adorn the rooftops of most of Little America’s buildings, not to mention that giant stuffed penguin in the lobby. Its population is even counted and recorded by the U.S. Signs advertising the hotel, and its signature 75-cent ice cream cones, start from a 100-mile radius around the Little America, inviting travelers to drop by a hotel that is so remote, it has its own ZIP code and is essentially its own city. LITTLE AMERICA - It’s impossible to miss the Little America Wyoming hotel and travel stop on Interstate 80 in southwest Wyoming even if it is, as travelers often note in their reviews, in the middle of nowhere.
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